Events’ external stakeholders and their influence strategies in tourism: perspectives from Borneo

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine external event stakeholders’ strategic actions to advance their interests in tourism events, based on their resource relationships with the event. It takes the novel approach of examining stakeholder influence strategies from the external stakeholder perspective. Design/methodology/approach The study used a qualitative case study research design, with five government-owned tourism events in Sarawak, involving primary data from 37 interviews with external stakeholders. Findings The stakeholders perceived that they were not overly dependent on the events studied due to their short duration. Two types of resource relationships were found: event-dependent stakeholders and event non-dependent stakeholders. Stakeholders were found to be deploying various influence strategies, which were largely subtle, positive and collaborative in nature, regardless of whether they were event-dependent or event non-dependent stakeholders. Research limitations/implications The findings are limited to the context examined in this study. Going forward, stronger public–private partnerships and formalised resource relationships are needed to ensure continuity of resource supplies and greater event innovation. Originality/value The study adds to the knowledge of how event external stakeholders exert their influence in accordance with their interests and resource dependency relationship with government-owned tourism events in the context of Sarawak, Borneo.